


and you are my heroine

by thimble



Category: Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica
Genre: Alternate Timelines, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-29
Updated: 2014-05-29
Packaged: 2018-01-27 01:55:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1710710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thimble/pseuds/thimble
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She met Sakura Kyoko on a grey Saturday morning, with rain lightly tapping at the window. (She’d amend the memory later, because there is nothing pallid, or cold or calm about Kyoko; she’s all fiery red and not just because of the hair, a girl that was equal parts temper and noise.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	and you are my heroine

**Author's Note:**

> crossposted from tumblr.

_I smelled like smoke  
and you smiled at me._

 

* * *

 

She met Sakura Kyoko on a grey Saturday morning, with rain lightly tapping at the window. (She’d amend the memory later, because there is nothing pallid, or cold or calm about Kyoko; she’s all fiery red and not just because of the hair, a girl that was equal parts temper and noise.) Kyoko’s mom met Sayaka’s at the supermarket, and as one thing led to another they agreed to have lunch at the Miki household to discuss converting to another religion over a hotpot and some sashimi. Sayaka had been present at the time, and Sakura-san had mentioned having a daughter about her age, so Kaasan extended the invite to include a playdate.

After their introduction and after the meal, they’re gently dismissed by the adults, who want to talk about grown-up matters without children present, so Sayaka led the way to her room and Kyoko followed. Sayaka sat on the bed, tongue-tied, while Kyoko glanced around. There was a certain tilt in her eyebrow that had Sayaka convinced that she was about to say something derisive about the posters taped to the walls.

"You like fairytales, huh?" There it was; Sayaka winced as she—

"Me too!"

—was proven wrong. Sayaka stared at Kyoko as she started babbling about which stories where her favorites, allowing space for Sayaka to provide her own answers before launching into another train of thought, another kind of monster she hated, another princess she wanted to save.

"We should play dress up," Kyoko decided, throwing open Sayaka’s closet and combing through the selections. "I’m gonna be the warrior. Do you have some kinda stick I can use for a sword?"

Sayaka knelt down and pulled out a box from under her bed, full of the toy weapons she collected exactly for this cause. Kyoko’s shriek of delight must’ve reached the neighbors.

When Kaasan called them out for an afternoon snack, Sayaka was wearing three layers of skirts and Kyoko had poked herself in the eye at least three times with her plastic spear, but their smiles were sunny enough to make up for the weather outside. Sayaka could count the number of times she’d ever laughed that hard on a single hand.

There was still something about the whole arrangement that frayed her nerves though.

"Next time," she began, after swallowing a small bite of melon bread. "I want to be the heroine."

"Sure," Kyoko said instantly, tearing the heads off Sayaka’s fears with her canine grin. "We’ll take turns. It’s tiring to do the work all the time, you know? Must be nice to just lay back and wait to get rescued."

"It’s not that easy," Sayaka had to say, in defense of the princesses. "You’ll have to deal with being cursed, and sometimes the dragons are mean."

"That’s right. So don’t take too long, okay?" Kyoko winked and took a long sip from her juicebox, and for some reason heat colored Sayaka’s cheeks when she nodded.

(Miki Sayaka was twelve years old, and somehow the promise she just made seemed bigger than all of the others she’d sworn before.)

 

* * *

 

_But though I loved I lost  
you to the clutches of the sea._

 

* * *

 

She nearly met Kyoko Sakura for the second time on the Monday after summer break, a memory she didn’t have to repair because it went exactly the way it should. Sayaka was eating lunch with Madoka on one side and Hitomi on the other, and maybe if she hadn’t looked up the moment she did her future would’ve gone differently, and she wouldn’t have been able to tell. Maybe she would’ve stayed in love with Kyousuke, or what she thought was love; maybe she would’ve forgotten about all the stories they reenacted, where hope and courage always won out in the end.

(The stories weren’t half as important as the girl she used to read them with, who walked and talked like she’d emerged from the pages herself.)

Maybe that’s what would’ve happened, but she did look up and Kyoko was twenty feet across from her, surrounded by classmates fawning over the new girl, the transfer student with hair redder than Fiji apples, three piercings in one ear, and a mouth that didn’t restrain itself from cursing even with teachers around. She was the Kyoko that Sayaka had known and she was not, though Sayaka wasn’t really the best judge of that. They’d only been friends for less than a year when Kyoko’s family moved away, because of some trouble in her father’s church that Kaasan refused to say much about.

But though she stared at Kyoko for what felt like hours, Kyoko never once looked her way. They were in a crowded cafeteria and it didn’t even seem like they were in the same class. If Kyoko recognized her from afar, there still wouldn’t have been need for acknowledgment, because sometimes the past best belonged where it was.

She went back to picking at her bento.

"You’re blushing, Sayaka-chan," Madoka said, all innocence and worry.

"Maybe she’s thinking about Kyousuke-kun," Hitomi pointed out, gently teasing, with an edge in her voice Sayaka couldn’t yet identify.

"My kimchi’s too spicy, that’s all!" Sayaka huffed with false indignation, pushing her box to the middle of the table, and Kyoko to the back of her mind. "Here, try some!"

Her friends laughed at her, sweet and familiar, as she tried to ignore the fire flickering to life in her peripheral.

 

* * *

 

_Now you wear the crown,  
and I’ll hold the sword._

 

* * *

 

She met Kyoko Sakura or Kyoko Sakura met her, she wasn’t sure, since it was Kyoko who threw the stones at her window and woke her up, for the third time, or the  _real_  second time, on a night that was neither hot or cool. The air was humid and her eyes were bleary when she glanced at the ground and saw the outline of a figure in the dark, red hair made brown by the moon’s uneasy light.

"Hey, princess!" Kyoko said, torn between a shout and a whisper. "Come down from your tower!"

She must’ve been dreaming; that was the only reason she closed the window again and headed outside, like Dream Kyoko told her to. Dream Kyoko had solid arms and a surprisingly warm hug, Sayaka found out, after Dream Kyoko greeted her with a grin and said, playful and fond,

"well aren’t you a sight for sore eyes."

Dream Kyoko went on to tell her that she had a falling out with her parents and had left them to live on her own; she chose this town to return to because it felt more like home than any place she’d been.

"I made a couple of friends here," Dream Kyoko said, her gaze on Sayaka as she said so. They were sadder this time around, and though still surreal it felt less like a dream; the Kyoko that Sayaka used to see in her sleep was always happy. (Sayaka couldn’t bear the thought of her as anything else.)

"You’ve been in school for three weeks," Sayaka spoke, finally, as the scales peeled away. "I thought you didn’t remember me."

Dream Kyoko, or just Kyoko, really, made an undignified snort. “Are you kidding? I thought  _you_  didn’t remember  _me_. That’s why I had to visit you like this. If you turned me down then we’d be the only ones who knew about it. I was scared that if I went up to you and you didn’t recognize who I was, your friends would laugh and there goes my good impression at a new school.”

Sayaka tried to picture Madoka or Hitomi laughing at anyone unkindly and had to roll her eyes. “What good impression? Everyone’s heard about you making that substitute cry. They all think you’re a scary girl.”

"She was picking on this kid who didn’t know the answer, I had to say something! Though I don’t mind being known as scary." Kyoko bared her teeth to show how her fangs became more prominent; Sayaka pretended to faint at the sight of them, and they shared a laugh that made their entire bodies ache from the force of it. Sayaka missed those, but she missed Kyoko more.

"You remembered, about the princess," she said, once they’ve calmed. She received an elbow in the side for that, but Sayaka barely registered it; all she was aware of was that this was either the end of a journey or the beginning of a new story. Maybe it was both.

"As if I’d forget, dumbass."

"It was your turn to get rescued, though."

Kyoko reached for her hand, palm clammy and touch electric, her voice tiny as she said, “then I guess it’s your turn to kiss me.”

 

* * *

 

_This time I’ll save you,  
for all my fragile life is worth._


End file.
